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Ruling less than three weeks after oral argument, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals on April 11, 2016 upheld a lower court’s ruling finding a duty on the part of Travelers to defend a class action lawsuit alleging a data breach by Portal Health Care Solutions, LLC ("Portal"). A 2013 class action had been filed against Portal and others alleging that plaintiffs’ private medical records had been made publicly available on the internet for more than four months. Three months after the class action was filed, Travelers sued Portal for a declaratory judgment in federal court in Virginia, seeking a declaration that it was not obligated under Commercial General Liability ("CGL") policies to defend Portal. The ground asserted by Travelers was that the class action complaint failed to allege a covered "publication" by Portal, a requirement under the CGL’s Coverage Part B - Personal and Advertising Injury.

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